


A Place You Need to Find

by reagancrew



Series: because when you're home, you're already home [2]
Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Adoption, F/F, Family Feels, Found Family, Kid Fic, Lena Luthor Needs a Hug, Lena Luthor-centric, Original Character(s), POV Lena Luthor, Parenthood, SuperCorp
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-19
Updated: 2018-06-19
Packaged: 2019-05-25 16:20:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,427
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14980922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reagancrew/pseuds/reagancrew
Summary: It has been ninety minutes since Lena went into a panic attack in front of the children – her children. Bellamy called her ‘mam’ and she couldn’t breathe, couldn’t speak, couldn’t move. But now, with Kara next to her and Moira shy and nervous sitting across from her, Lena is sure. Lena is certain and confident and ready.





	A Place You Need to Find

**Author's Note:**

> Anyone else super impressed with how Lena Luthor only ever seems to shed a single tear? I headcanon Lena as stoic to the max – and the show kind of backs this idea up (her ability to hold in her tears is legen.dary). So, when would Lena Luthor flat out sob? Oh, honey, I’m so glad you asked. #KidFic
> 
> //
> 
> “some people say home is where you come from. but i think it’s a place you need to find, like it’s scattered and you pick pieces of it up along the way.”  
> — katie kacvinsky

He wants the banana he can barely see over the lip of the counter: that’s why he calls for her. It’s after dinner, and he’s bathed and is dressed in his elephant footy pajamas, but now he wants dessert: that’s why he calls. Kara’s gotten him ready for bed, but now she’s escaped to the office at the back of the apartment to finalize edits on a piece for Snapper, and Lena has yet to complete the email she’s been obsessing over for the last hour: that’s why he calls for her and not her wife. He calls and calls, but she doesn’t realize he’s calling for _her_ for the first three minutes, until Moira yells from her room, “Lena! Bell needs you!”  


“Mam!” he calls. “Nanner, Mam! Mam! Nanner! Up! MAM!”  


He calls for her, but she doesn’t hear him for the first 180 seconds, and when Moira’s voice echoes down the hallway, followed quickly by her thumping footsteps coming to investigate, Lena snaps her laptop shut and spins to face the toddler. “Bellamy. What is it, sweet boy?”  


“Mam!” he grins to have her attention. Her own smile slips. “Mam! Nanner, please,” he points towards the unoffending fruit, and Lena’s stomach roils as though she’s back on that plane with Edge so many years ago, the ground dropping out from beneath her feet without warning. “Mam? Nanner,” the baby reminds her.  


Lena is frozen, unable to stand or speak or rearrange her face so she looks less like a stunned animal trapped in headlights.  


“Mam?” Bellamy is not used to being ignored for so long.  


“Hey, buddy,” Moira sweeps past Lena at the table and swoops her brother into her arms. “Banana?” she holds it up for his closer inspection and he nods excitedly.  


“Nanner!” he echoes, clapping his hands.  


Lena is still staring at where the toddler was standing; his head a safe four inches below the counter, his arms not yet long enough to reach his own snacks. She is vaguely aware of Moira cooing to the baby as she cuts the banana into pieces with a butter knife, Bellamy held securely in one arm. She is vaguely aware of her own hands coming up to cup her cheeks, to move her face back into a less terrified position. She is vaguely aware that there is something sharp in her chest, cutting in on each breath so it is difficult to fill her lungs on each inhale.  


Lena doesn’t hear Moira move closer to her until the thirteen year old is standing over her, Bellamy still in her grasp, now happily munching on his dessert. “Lena?”  


Lena jumps.  


“Mam!” Bell screeches. “Mam, lookie!”  


Lena drags her eyes to the boy, manages to lower her hands into her lap, but still gasps on each breath.  


“Lena?” Moira is staring at her worriedly. She bounces the toddler to quiet him. “Lena? Are you – I mean - do you need Kara?” Mo bites her lip, still just a kid, and glances back down the hallway to where Kara’s closed the office door. “I could call her.”  


“Sorry,” Lena pants. “Mo, can you-“  


“I’ve got Bell,” Moira promises. “But mom?”  


Lena can’t help flinching at the word, leaning away from the children automatically.  


“Sorry,” Moira mutters, taking a step back. “I’ll get her. Sorry.”  


Lena shakes her head no, but she cannot get the words out to explain that it is not because she doesn’t want her wife, but rather that Moira has nothing to be sorry for. Bellamy’s first word was ‘momma;’ Kara has been ‘mom’ to him since he could talk, and Moira had only started using it regularly the month before, has just gotten to the point where she doesn’t stumble over the word or blush or bite her lip as if afraid someone’s going to reprimand her for it. Lena shakes her head no, but she cannot speak to reassure her children that they have done nothing wrong.  


Logically, Lena can recognize that she is having a panic attack; she could name the trigger; she could even possibly have predicted it, but that doesn’t mean she can control it. She clenches her hands into fists her lap as her eyes start to well with tears.  


“Mam?” Bell is just a baby, but he can tell something is wrong, and the innocent question causes Lena to hunch her shoulders, protecting her from the worried looks of both children.  


“We’re going, Lena,” Moira promises quickly, heading for the hall. “Mo – _Kara’s_ coming.”  


Lena wants to rise and follow them, call them back so she can assure them they’ve done nothing wrong, finish Bellamy’s banana treat with him and giggle about brushing teeth, but she is trapped in the chair, her hands tangling over and over each other in her lap as she begins to sob, tears dripping hot on her skirt. With super speed, it takes Kara exactly 10.4 seconds to learn about Lena from Mo and arrive in the kitchen, but it feels like hours as Lena’s lungs burn and her throat closes around her gasps.  


“Lee, honey,” Kara puts a warm hand on the back of Lena’s neck, the other on her twisting, twisting hands. “Lee,” she whispers.  


Lena tries. For her wife, she tries to explain: “He – the ba – Bell-“  


“I heard, honey,” Kara murmurs, and Lena clutches at her wife’s arm desperately, so thankful not to have to explain and panicked at the reminder. Her stomach heaves and she chokes, dry heaving. “Honey,” Kara is worried, Lena can tell. She can always tell when Kara is worried or upset or frustrated. “Honey, c’mon.”  


Lena can’t even see Kara through the tears in her eyes, but she feels Kara’s arm come under her knees and then swing her up into her arms as though she is nothing but a child herself. With the kids just in the next room, Kara doesn’t fly, but she speeds quickly into their bedroom, knocking the door shut with her foot, and then flying into the bathroom, settling in the tub with Lena still in her lap.  


“I – I can’t,” Lena does not beg, but is pleading with her wife, pleading for some kind of relief. “I – he – Bell –“  


“It’s alright, sweets,” Kara whispers, holding Lena gently to her chest and reaching for the faucet. “It’s alright. You just need to breathe. C’mon, Lee, you can do it. Breathe with me.”  


“Bellamy,” Lena gets out around the pain in her chest; it’s radiating outwards now: she can feel it spiking in her stomach, lancing up and down her spine.  


“Mo’s got him,” Kara promises. “She’s gonna put him to bed. They’re alright.” Lena can’t breathe, but Kara knows that their children are her only true concern. “They’re okay, Lee.”  


“I – I couldn’t –“ Lena still cannot form a sentence, and her face is flushed, sticky from tears that keep falling, drenching Kara’s shirt.  


“I’m gonna turn on the water, sweets,” Kara warns her. “Here it comes.”  


Lena has had six panic attacks since she and Kara got together, and the last two happened at home, where Kara discovered the hot water of the shower helped Lena loosen up, and the steam cleared her out, until she could breathe freely on her own. Lena squeezes Kara’s shoulders; face turned into her chest as the spray hits them, hot on their covered skin.  


“Now, breathe with me,” Kara orders, this too, familiar. “Breathe, Lena,” she orders.  


And Lena tries. She tries. She forces herself to relax her hold on Kara’s shoulders, to focus on the water hitting just below her shoulder blades, on the steam around filling the room, on Kara’s arms around her, on her own lungs fighting and fighting and fighting to be full. She closes her eyes, blocks out thoughts of the children, of Bellamy probably sucking his fingers in his big boy bed, of Moira’s face in the kitchen – shocked and scared and a little bit unsurprised – of Bell’s voice, high and sweet: “Mam! Mammmm!” She shuts them down, each image of their beautiful voices, blocking them out so that she can dismantle the pain in her chest, empty her lungs and fill them again, breathe. She tries. And tries.  


“Good, honey,” she feels Kara’s murmur against her forehead. “Good.”  


It is over an hour later before Lena can breathe without pain, before her tears have fully dried, and Kara has slipped into the bedroom for dry clothes for them both, leaving a pile of their wet things in the shower. It is over an hour before they are both wrapped in blankets on the floor of the bathroom, Kara holding Lena’s hand solidly in her own, Lena leaning against the wall while Kara reclines against the tub. It is over an hour before Lena can picture Bell’s dark hair and Moira’s worried eyes without falling back into a panic, before she can imagine Bell’s tight hold on his teddy as he sleeps, and Moira, hair swept behind her ear, biting her lip with her knees drawn up to her chest, lost in her newest autobiography.  


* * *

It is over an hour before Kara breaks the stillness, “Maybe it was too soon. Maybe we’ve pushed too far too fast.”  


Lena squeezes her hand, but doesn’t respond.  


Kara rolls her head to look at her wife, her eyes flicking over Lena’s still-hunched shoulders, her legs crossed and hands trembling infinitesimally in her lap. “Maybe we should have waited a little longer before talking to the kids about it.”  


Lena shakes her head at this.  


“Honey,” Kara is trying to be kind, Lena knows it, but she is _wrong_. “It’s ok if-“  


“No!” Lena’s voice is scratchy, deeper than normal. “No! We were both ready. We – _I_ didn’t want to wait anymore,” she meets Kara’s gaze, “ _we_ didn’t want to wait anymore.”  


“I know,” Kara lets out a heavy sigh. “But maybe we should have…” She lets go of Lena’s hand to gesture, spreading her fingers wide and fanning her hands out between them. 

“Maybe then we could have been ready for this.”  


“You mean I could have been ready for this,” Lena doesn’t mean to bite back, but she is still exhaling sharpness with each breath.  


Kara’s hands flutter and then still in her own lap.  


Lena closes her eyes and leans her had back against the tile, still slick from the steam. “God, Kara. Do you think I _wanted_ to react that way? To scare or scar the children just because of a sill – silly little – “ she stumbles, takes three deep breaths, stops.  


“Our children,” Kara corrects in a whisper. “And they are fine.”  


“They’re not ours,” Lena rebels.  


“Not yet.”  


Lena can hear the smile in her wife’s voice, the gentle reminder, the joy. But she only feels fear, deep and gaping, ready to swallow her and her entire family at a moment’s notice.  


Lena listens to the water drip in the shower for five beats before, “Maybe we _did_ move too quickly,” she takes up Kara’s earlier argument. “Maybe they’re not ready; maybe Mo was just telling us what she thought we wanted to hear.”  


“Honey,” Kara’s voice is fond, all the worry gone, and Lena wonders at her wife’s ability to see the best in every situation in every person. “Moira was ready. She had plenty of time to think about it, to talk to her therapist and her friends and even Eliza. She was ready. And so were we.”  


“But Bell-“  


“Bellamy has never known another family, Lee. Moira said so herself. They were both ready.”  


“Bell’s been calling you ‘mom’ since he could talk,” Lena is arguing with herself, more than with Kara, but her tone is belligerent. “But me, I – “  


“Lee,” Kara stops her, reaches out and wraps a hand around her wrist firmly. “Please. Come here,” Kara scoots closer so their knees are knocking against each other, their shoulders pressed together. Lena lets her head fall onto her wife’s shoulder. “Please,” Kara repeats, rubbing her thumb in circles on Lena’s wrist.  


They sit quietly for a moment, Lena counting Kara’s breaths rather than her own, imagining the Sunday morning Mo had come into their room two months before, eyes red-rimmed and fingers twisting together. Kara had flipped back the covers and Mo had snuggled in next to her, reaching across Kara to hold Lena’s hand on top of the covers. _“Are you sure?”_ she’d whispered, biting her lip, still just a child. Lena squeezed her hand and Kara had kissed the side of her forehead, smiling easy and open, _“We’re sure, kiddo. We are 100% positive.”_ Silence then in their room, the three of them holding onto each other. Lena had wished for her wife’s super hearing in that moment so she could have listened to Bellamy’s tiny snores in the next room, sleeping in. Finally, Lena’d broken the silence, _“And remember, Mo, if you don’t want this for you or your brother, it’s alright. Nothing has to change. You will both have a home here as long as you’d like.”_ Moira had squeezed back then and snuggled closer to Kara. _“I know,”_ she’d mumbled. _“But, I think – I mean, I’m ready. We’re ready. We want this, too. Bell and me – we want you guys.”_ _“Yeah?”_ Kara had whispered, and Lena knew it was taking her wife a herculean effort not to squeal in delight. _“Yeah,”_ Mo had whispered back, blushing and embarrassed and happy. _“Alright,”_ Lena had whispered for all of them. _“Alright.”_ It is not simple, but it is right.  


“They picked us,” Kara murmurs, as if she can read Lena’s thoughts. “Mo could have chosen to stay without the paperwork. But they picked us.”  


“I know. I know they did, but-“  


Kara shifts and Lena lifts her head as the door to their bedroom swishes open and footsteps pad to the bathroom door. “Kara?” Moira’s voice is soft outside the door as she knocks twice. “Lena?”  


Kara glances at her and Lena nods, rubbing her face one more time. “Come on in, Mo,” Kara calls.  


Lena’s hands are trembling again as she attempts to sit up straighter against the wall, but Kara’s fingers are gentle against her wrist. Moira peers around the door as if she’s afraid she’ll find them compromised.  


“Come on in,” Kara encourages her again, smiling as the teenager steps fully around the door and sinks to the floor, too, gangly legs crossed and chin resting in her palm. She starts playing with the bath mat, taking quick, sharp glances up at Lena, who tries to rearrange her face into something welcoming, something steady.  


“Hey,” Moira mumbles to the floor.  


Kara’s smile widens. “Hey, kid.”  


“Hi,” Moira directs shyly at Lena’s ankles.  


It has been ninety minutes since Lena went into a panic attack in front of the children – her children. Bellamy called her ‘mam’ and she couldn’t breathe, couldn’t speak, couldn’t move, but now, with Kara next to her and Moira shy and nervous sitting across the floor, Lena is sure. Lena is certain and confident and ready. “Moira,” she says the girl’s name firmly, without a hint of hesitation, and Moira looks up at her in surprise, making eye contact for the first time in an hour and a half. “Come here,” Lena pats the floor next to her, and the teenager doesn’t manage to hide her look of delight immediately before she scoots next to Lena, not quite touching. Lena wraps an arm around the girl’s thin shoulders without hesitation. “Hello, darling,” Lena murmurs, pressing a kiss to her forehead. Moira flushes, pleased.  


“Hi,” she whispers again, sinking into Lena’s side. “Are you ok?”  


“I am,” Lena nods, and is only a little surprised to realize this is not at all a lie, not with Kara at her side and Moira pressed up against her.  


“Bell’s asleep.”  


Kara grins around Lena, “Thanks, kid.”  


Moira only smiles shyly in response, before she looks pensive and then a little afraid. “Bell is,” she swallows, “Bell’s sorry, Lena. He didn’t mean to make you upset.”  


“Sweet girl,” Lena shakes her head, “No, darling, Bellamy did nothing wro-“  


“He’s only a baby!” Moira bursts out, stretching away from Lena suddenly; as if she’s desperate to get this out, make Lena understand. “He didn’t know what he was saying! I’ll make sure he doesn’t say it again!”  


“Darling, Moira, Mo, hush,” Lena turns so Kara is at her back and her hands are free to come up and hold Moira’s cheeks. “It’s alright.”  


“I know we both call Kara that, and I know you guys are going through the adoption, and I want that! Me and Bell, we both want that!”  


“I know, darling. We know that. It’s o-“  


“And even if legally you’re – our – _that_ –“ Moira is struggling not to use the word, “that’s okay! Bell and I, we’re okay with that! We just – we lo-love you. We’re okay with anything as long as we can stay here with you. You and Kara. Okay? We’re okay with it if you – if you don’t want to be ou-our mom.”  


Moira is crying and Lena feels her own tears at the back of her throat. Moira has put her baby brother to bed, and decided for the both of them who they want their family to be, but she is still just a child, just a kid, and Lena aches for her, aches for this girl who is smart and brave and kind.  


“Darling-“  


“Bell won’t say it again. Promise! You don’t have to be mom for us, just Lena. Just Lena!”  


“Honey,” Lena is firm now, as calm for Moira as Kara was for her earlier. “Darling, look at me.”  


Moira manages to open her eyes and stares at Lena through her tears, her lips quivering.  


“Darling,” Lena pulls the girl forward into a hug. “It’s alright. I’m not upset with you, or with your brother. I wasn’t earlier and I’m not now. And Kara and I love you no matter what, if you’re ours legally or if you just want to sleep here and eat our food and tease Kara about her zombie personality in the morning. We _love_ you and Bell no matter what. _I_ -“ Lena stumbles for the first time, but her arms are tight around Moira, “ _I_ love you no matter what.”  


Moira pulls away to look at Lena, “But you were so upset. And Bell didn’t mean it.”  


“I know, sweet girl. I know,” Lena brushes a strand of hair behind Moira’s ear, and sits back on her heels. Moira knows that Lena and Kara were both adopted. She knows that Lena called Lillian Luthor mother, but doesn’t speak about her now; she knows Kara loves Eliza Danvers like a mother, but only calls her that on special, special occasions; she knows that Kara and Lena love her and Bellamy, she does. “I-“ Lena bites her lip now, and then she feels Kara’s soft kiss to the back of her neck and she relaxes, smiles gently at Moira and presses her palm into the girl’s. “I was surprised,” she explains, haltingly. “I was surprised when Bellamy called me that – called me…’mam.’” Kara presses another kiss just below her ear, and Lena continues, Moira staring at her fiercely. “I never thought I’d be a mother,” she breathes in and out, in and out. “I never thought I’d have a family, just because of my own family when I was growing up. I didn’t think it would be for me, no,” she shakes her head at herself and Moira wraps her fingers around Lena’s as if to offer some of herself. “No,” she smiles at Mo in gratitude. “I did not think I would make a good member of a family, because of who I grew up as, and the family I was a part of.”  


Moira is ready to interrupt, Lena can tell, so she begins to speak more quickly. “My mother wasn’t someone you could look up to; she offered her love for a price, always for a price, and I never wanted to be that kind of mother to someone else. I didn’t know how else to be, Mo. I was sure that if I ever became a mother, I’d fall into the same pattern, I’d be unable to love freely without needing anything in return, because no one had ever taught me how.” Moira’s lips are parted, her eyes never leaving Lena’s face. Lena takes a deep breath, and nothing burns, “But then I met Kara,” she feels a warm exhale on the back of her neck and works not to shiver, “and then Kara and I met you and Bell. And I – well, it was so easy. It is so _easy_ to love you. You and your brother.” Lena stares back at Moira, willing her to hear her in her entirety. “You are both so easy to love. So easy that it-it scares me a little bit, Mo.”  


“Why?” she breathes the question.  


“Because, I – because you could choose not to stay or to look for a different family, and Moira, I’d fight like hell for you –“ Moira’s eyes go wide at the swear – “for you and Bell, but I know that at the end of the day, if you came to me and said you’d found someone else, someone you loved as family more, I’d let you go. I’d let you go, because all I want is for the two of you to be happy: to be safe and content and _loved_. And I’d love you if you went, Mo. I’d never stop loving you. And it’s, well,” Lena laughs a little, “it’s terrifying.”  


Lena pauses, lets Moira think for a moment, waits until the girl’s dark eyes meet her own again, her thin face set, determined. “I don’t know how to be a mother, Moira. And I’m terrified. So when Bell called me that, all I could think about was my fear – my fear of not being enough for the two of you,” she leans back against Kara quickly, “the three of you. And that’s why I froze. Not because of you, or because of Bell. Never because of either of you. You see?”  


Moira shrugs. “I guess?”  


She is just a child, and Lena has to squeeze her hands together to keep from pulling her into a hug too soon.  


“So, you’re not mad at us?”  


“No,” Lena is adamant.  


“And you’re not mad that we call Kara ‘mom?’”  


“No, darling,” softer but no less sure.  


“Kara?”  


“You know you can call me whatever you want, Mo,” Kara’s grin is still easy, still open, still sure, and this seems to give the teenager confidence, because she turns back to Lena and scoots closer.  


“Lena?”  


“Hm?”  


“What if Bell did keep calling you that – you know – ‘mam…’ Do you think you’d get used to it?” She rushes on before Lena can respond, “Because you’re our family now, and Bell – we – love you and you love us so well. Lena, okay? I promise. You love us so well.”  


She is a child. Lena is crying again. She is a child, but Lena cannot help but ask, “I do?”  


“Yeah,” Moira nods vigorously. “Yeah you do.”  


And then they are hugging, Lena pulling Moira into her lap as if she is a much younger child, and Moira holding her tightly, unabashedly showing affection with every ounce of her strength.  


“I love you, Lena. Bell loves you, too.”  


“I love you, darling. Sweet girl. I love you both so much.”  


Kara gives them twenty seconds and then she’s throwing her arms around them both. “You never let me say I love you when I drop you off at school,” she jokes, snuffling a kiss on Lena’s ear and then Moira’s hair, and Moira pulls away at last, laughing high and loud and clear.  


“Because you’re embarrassing when you say it,” Moira jokes, and Kara can only look offended for a moment before she’s grinning again, and Lena is leaning back against her, still holding Moira close.  


“So,” Moira looks back at Lena expectantly, her eyes shining but her tone serious again, “If Bell kept calling you that….”  


“Darling,” Lena is shy now.  


“We love you,” Moira reminds her.  


Lena nods. “Yes. Alright.”  


“Alright?”  


“Alright.” It is not so simply. But for now, it can be. For now, it is right.  


Kara cheers and Lena shushes her because, “The baby!” and then Kara hauls Lena to her feet and gives Moira a hand, and is cheering in a whisper. “Love you both, and also ice cream?” she asks innocently, wagging her eyebrows at her wife and smirking at Mo.  


“Alright,” Lena agrees again. “I suppose,” Kara is already on her way to the kitchen. Moira takes Lena’s hand, leading her mother along. 

* * *

“Mo! We’re going to be late! Hurry up and get out here with your brother please!” Lena calls down the hallway. “We’ve got to be to the courthouse in,” she checks her watch and holds in a groan, “twenty minutes.”  


“I’m coming, I’m coming,” Moira huffs as she tumbles into the hall, still tugging on her shoe.  


“Mo let’s go!” Bellamy chants, four years old and proud of his rhymes. “Let’s go, Mo!”  


“I’m coming, dude,” Mo assures him. “Where’s mom?” she grabs the yogurt and banana off the counter that Lena laid out for her, before reaching around her brother for her coat.  


“Meeting us there,” Lena is tipping the last of the coffee into her cup, and reaching for her phone, harried and nervous. “Can you get your brother, please!”  


Bell is still singing, jumping up and down in place, shoes untied. “On it,” Moira bends down to fix his laces, and Lena sweeps around the counter heading for the front door. “Here we go, Bell!” Mo picks her brother up one-armed and he squeals in delight.  


“Let’s go, Mo!” he calls into her face, and she laughs. “Let’s go, Mam!” he cheers and Lena manages a smile when he scrunches up his face at the lack of rhyme. “Let’s gam, Mam?” He tries, and Lena’s smile grows.  


“Yeah,” Moira parrots, smirking, “let’s gam, Mam!”  


Lena laughs at them, holding open the door and directing them out of it. “Alright, you two. We are late. Let’s gam.”  


Bellamy shrieks with delight at his mother’s use of the word, and proceeds to chant it for the rest of the way to the car, Moira and Lena chiming in as they walk.  


“Let’s gam, Mam! Let’s gam!”

**Author's Note:**

> Kara Danvers and Lena Luthor adopt kids. I'll fight you on this one. 
> 
> Also, Moira and Bellamy are my two new dudes, ya know. So, if you wanna know more about them as people, tiny humans, new members of the Danvers(-Luthor) fam, let me know. I'm here, and also (of course) over on tumblr: reagancrew. 
> 
> This was supposed to be one of those 4+1 (5+1?) fics where Lena Luthor _didn't_ cry at opportune moments, but I just really wanted to write _this_ moment right meow, so if you're like, please write some more about this family, I'd be happy to oblige. #sendprompts 
> 
> Love.


End file.
